


Body Talk and Bruises

by stoprobbers



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Anger, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, and that's what this fic plays around with, if you think about it the core of jonathan byers' emotional arc center around anger, pent up anger, these tags make it all sound darker than i think it really is
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-07
Updated: 2017-12-07
Packaged: 2019-02-11 20:11:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12942870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stoprobbers/pseuds/stoprobbers
Summary: -it all ends up in a slanging match with body talk and bruises, a change is better than a rest, silly beggars can't be choosersHe should be happy. Will is safe, his family is whole, the gate is closed, they saved the day, he got the girl. He should be happy.So why does he feel like he wants to scream?





	Body Talk and Bruises

**Author's Note:**

> I'm just playing around in Jonathan's head. 
> 
> Title and quoted lyric taken from the Elvis Costello song "Pidgin English," which is a great song but has absolutely nothing to do with this fic other than how much I like that one line for it, and also the brief cameo made by "Imperial Bedroom," which is a great album.

He should be happy. Will is safe, his family is whole, the gate is closed, they saved the day, he got the girl. He should be happy.

So why does he feel like he wants to scream?

He thought he was being brave. He was being a good friend. His life was a little more together, his brother was back in the land of the living, the girl he was crazy about (not his girl, not yet, but maybe, _maybe_ , _in time_ ) needed his help, and that's him: helpful, brave, loyal Jonathan Byers. He could take on a Demogorgon and he could take down a government lab. He could kiss the girl of his dreams in a conspiracy theorist's underground bunker and be back by lunch the next day, no one the wiser but the world a little safer.

He thought things had changed, that _he_ had changed. But then he opened his front door and saw the maze of drawings all over the walls, the floor, the ceiling, felt his stomach drop like a rock, and knew nothing had changed at all. The world was out to get his family and he couldn't do a goddamn _thing_ to stop them. As usual.

(They stopped it, of course. Nancy held his hand and his mother burned a _thing_ out of Will and a little girl who had escaped from a life of imprisonment only a year before closed a gate to another world and the rest of the town went to work and school on Monday like nothing had _fucking_ happened.)

His mother is a nervous wreck. It's not the first time – she was this way when his father was home and drinking, then again when he left, when Will was taken and when they got him back. Her nerves are frayed and on the one hand he can't blame her, but on the other hand he can't stop blaming her. Where is the woman, eyes on fire and voice full of steel, who looked straight at him and declared, "I _want_ to kill it"? The woman who sat in their living room with an axe and a gut full of determination as she waited for a monster to come out of the wall?

He wants that woman back, wants her to be his mother instead of this frail, frazzled woman who is so _afraid_. Afraid to let Will out of her sight. Afraid when he takes a late shift, or stays too long at Nancy's, or when one of the boys' campaigns goes late. Who calls the Wheelers' house, frantic, begging. He can hear Mrs. Wheeler placating her on the phone all the way up in Nancy's room with the door closed and music on, and it ruins the mood every time.

Nancy is understanding, always understanding. She kisses his face all over and tells him it's okay, she'll see him tomorrow, and he promises to make it up to her (he usually does, once he gets some space and calms down, climbing back through her window at 2 in the morning and doing things that make her cover her face with a pillow to stay quiet), but inside his blood boils and roils, swells of fury rising up to his ears and making it hard to hear.

His anger rings in the key of E, he finds.

It's not that he doesn't love his mother. Or that he doesn't understand what she's going through. He catches her looking wistfully at Will's old drawings, or her Dolly Parton records, or sometimes even the cassette tapes he leaves around the house. He knows she longs for the days when her biggest problem was Lonnie's abandonment and making sure she has enough shifts at the store to buy them Christmas presents. He longs for those days too. But they're over now and he can't do this alone.

She told him once he didn't have to, but he's not sure he believes her anymore.

On the nights he doesn't see Nancy he clamps his headphones on and cranks the volume all the way up and lets Johnny Rotten scream into the void in his head. He thinks about how it felt when fist met flesh in an alley with a big-haired boy and his friends taunting him about a girl, his family, his mom, his brother. He thinks about how good it felt to explode, to shrug off the label of 'weirdo' and put on the armor of 'dangerous.' How good the ache in his hands felt after. He digs his short nails into his palms to keep from punching his bedroom wall. He doesn't want to patch another hole.

+++

No one in his house sleeps. Will tosses and turns, shoots awake with a gasp over and over again - remembering, revisiting, reliving. He swears he hasn't actually gone back to the Upside Down since Eleven closed the gate, but Jonathan knows neither he nor his mother can really believe that, not until there's some kind of proof.

Usually his mother scurries into Will's room with the first restless noise he makes, already awake amidst her own nightmares. But other times she's actually managed to fall asleep and miraculously stays that way, so Jonathan runs down the hall and gets into bed with his little brother and holds him close as he slowly falls back asleep, watching the shadows in the corner of the room. Waiting. Ready.

A few times a week he climbs into Nancy's bedroom, taking solace in her body and cat naps in her arms. Less often she climbs into his window and into his bed. She doesn't always call but she also never surprises him; he's rarely asleep when she gets there.

She runs her fingertips over the bags under his eyes, kisses him softly in a way he knows means comfort, security.

"You need to sleep," she tells him. He never has a response to that.

But she doesn't sleep well either, moaning and whimpering, grasping at his shirt or his skin, burrowing into him, trying to find a safe place. He knows because he watches her, strokes her hair, murmurs into her ear. He watches the shadows and doesn't tell her how his father's gun is under his bed. He should – she's a better shot than him.

In the morning she asks him if he had any bad dreams and he says no. It's not a lie; you can't dream if you don't sleep.

+++

He thinks people at his school are scared of him.

He's got a reputation now. A different reputation – darker, more dangerous, something to be feared but not necessarily respected.

He cannot fucking _wait_ until high school is over.

He eats mostly on the hood of his car, usually with Nancy and sometimes alone. Sometimes Steve drops by, says hi, gives him a look that means he's pretty sure he cares about Jonathan's wellbeing but isn't sure how to reconcile that with the fact that the school weirdo stole his girlfriend right out from under his nose. Jonathan's not sure how to explain that Nancy's not a _thing_ to be stolen, and the only way anyone can have her is if she wants it.

He's not sure how to explain the look she gets when monster hunting or hatching plans to bring down government labs. "Determined" isn't a strong enough word. If Steve can't see it, he's not sure how to help.

After lunch he turns on his car stereo and he and Nancy stretch out on the hood, their backs on his windshield. The songs are darker now, sadder and angrier than what he was listening to a month ago when things were… different. Better, perhaps.

She doesn't ask, just holds his hand and puts her head on his shoulder, breathes with him.

He appreciates that but he wishes she would pry, wishes she would prod, wishes she would yell and give him a reason to yell back.

He feels like he's going to scream, all the time.

+++

When the boys are over to play Atari or D&D it's not so bad, but when it's just the three of them the house is so tense it makes his back ache.

His mother hovers. His brother cowers. He sulks.

An errand to the grocery store is a 20-minute negotiation and mini custody battle. He wants to remind his mother Will's his brother, not his son, and that while he might be the man of the house he's still hasn't even turned 18 and this isn't fair.

But most of all he wants to grab her shoulders, shake her hard, and tell her to _relax._

He doesn't lay his hands on her – he would never – but he does tell her to relax, and apparently that's the final straw.

"Relax? _Relax_?" His mother's eyes are fire, her face pale with anger. She grabs his elbow and drags him down the hall, away from Will, whose head is hanging as he sits on the sofa. He feels so bad for his little brother, and resents him for all of this at the same time. And doesn't that just make him the worst? None of this is Will's fault.

"How dare you tell me to relax," his mother whispers furiously, yanking him by the chin so they're making eye contact. "We don't know what is happening with that world, with that lab. We don't know that he, or any of us, is safe. I am your mother, and I will protect _both_ of you if it is the last thing I do."

"Mom, the lab is gone—"

" _Bullshit_. They may have closed that building but _she_ is still here."

"Hopper—"

"Hopper can't stop them any more than they could stop that _thing_ inside of Will. The best Hopper can do is protect her, just like I protect you."

And just like that, he can't hold it in anymore.

"You're not _protecting_ us. You're _smothering_ us! Will can't take a piss without you checking on him, you are watching him _all the time_ and it's not making him better, it's making him worse! He can't be a kid and I can't be a teenager and you can't be a person because you're wound so _fucking tight_!"

His mother is staring at him open mouthed, eyes shifting like an oil slick between horror, anger, and anguish. He wants to stop, wants to comfort her, but the floodgates have opened and he's been holding this in for more than a year and it's all coming out now whether he wants it to or not.

"We don't sleep, and we barely eat, and we jump at every sound the house makes and we're all going _insane_! Everyone in this family just needs to _relax!_ " he shouts and means it, but he's as far from relaxed as is possible.

Fury, _rage_ courses through his veins and pools in his head and he feels like he might explode. He wishes he was a decent shot, that he could get the shotgun out of the shed, go out into the woods and shoot cans until there's shrapnel scattered over the grass and the pounding in his ears recedes, but he can't he's a _fucking awful_ shot, and he just wants to destroy something so he can find pieces to put back together.

Which is how he finds himself standing in Steve Harrington's driveway, breathing hard and wild-eyed, asking with no small hint of desperation, "You still have that bat, right?"

Which is how he finds himself out in the woods with his girlfriend's very confused and possibly concerned ex-boyfriend watching him line up glass bottles down the stumps and smash them with a baseball bat he hammered full of nails to fight a monster.

He is nothing but the harshness of his breath, the wood in his hands, the sweat under his clothes. The knot between his shoulders starts to unkink, just barely. Which is of course when:

"What the hell? _Jonathan?_ "

Nancy's standing 20 feet away, shielding her eyes against the setting sun and looking stunned. The bat falls to his side but stays in his hand, though he almost takes a chunk out of his leg. She walks straight to him – he's not sure if she's noticed Steve – but stops a couple feet away.

"Nancy." He's really not sure what to say other than her name. He wants to go back to smashing bottles. He doesn't want to think right now.

"Are you okay?" She doesn't sound angry, she sounds worried.

"Um."

He just stops there, mind tantalizingly close to silent for the first time in he can't remember how long. It's all he can do to maintain eye contact.

His perception of time is off, slowed by sadness, stretched by rage, and he's really not sure how long this increasingly awkward silence can last, but then Steve pipes up.

"Hey, uh, can I get a turn?"

They turn. Jonathan had almost forgotten he was there. He looks at Nancy, then the bat, then the bottles. He has another bag of them in the car.

"Sure."

He flips the bat in the air, is annoyed and impressed when Steve catches the right end. He sees the other boy's eyes linger on the girl at his side for just an extra beat before sliding up to meet his own. Steve flashes him a big grin and then spins and gracefully arcs it into a champagne bottle with a gleeful whoop. The bottle shatters with a loud pop.

Nancy takes his hands between hers and squeezes. When he looks down at her he can't read her expression.

"Can I go next?"

All three of them lay on the ground amidst the shattered glass afterward, breathing hard. Nancy keeps his hand tight in hers. Steve breaks the silence first.

"That felt good."

"Yeah," Nancy agrees, nodding.

He wishes he was alone, wishes he could yell his frustration to the sky and that no one was around to hear it. He wishes Steve was gone and he could press Nancy into the cold winter ground, take from her the comfort he needs, the release.

He doesn't say anything, just stares at the sky until it burns his retinas then closes his eyes and watches the afterimages fade.

+++

When he gets home the sun is going down and his mother is waiting on the porch steps, smoking a cigarette, watching the driveway. He wishes Nancy had come with him, wishes he had a buffer or an excuse to avoid this, but she had borrowed her mother's car to find him and had to bring it back.

He parks his car, shuts it off, stares at the steering wheel for a long moment before taking a deep breath and getting out of the car. His mother stands to meet him.

They look at each other for a long time, and then she opens her arms. He moves into them instantly, holding her tight and pressing his face into her shoulder, breathing her in, that smell of mom, and home, and safe.

"I'm sorry," she says, stroking his hair gently, like she did when he was younger, like she does now with Will. "I'm so sorry, Jonathan."

"It's okay," he mumbles, feels her shake her head.

"It's not. It's really not. You've been through so much. We've _all_ been through so much," she pulls back, takes his shoulders, looks him square in the eye. He can see she's been crying.

"I told you you're not alone, and you're not. You have been, but you're not anymore. We're gonna get through this, and we're gonna get through it together, okay? You, me, Will. We're a team."

His mom's not the best talker; he thinks, sometimes, he learned it from her. Keeping it all quiet, all inside. So when she tries to break through it's awkward, stumbling, pained. But he knows what she's saying, knows what she means. Knows she believes it.

He'll try to believe it too.

"I love you," she says and pulls him in for another hug, this one even tighter. "I love you so much."

"I love you too, Mom," he replies and squeezes. It takes her breath away a little bit and he loosens up and they both laugh softly. He's so much bigger than he used to be. So much stronger. It still takes them both by surprise.

"I'm sorry I left, I went—"

She releases him, cuts him off with a wave of her hand.

"It's okay. You don't need to tell me, I know you can handle yourself." She steps back, up one step onto the porch properly, and gives him a once-over. He knows he's dirty, he knows his hands look raw and his hair is a mess. He wonders what she thinks he was doing.

"You kinda stink, though. So take a shower." She gives him a lopsided grin – the one she saves just for him, the one he knows he makes too – and goes back inside.

+++

Nancy's sitting on his bed when he gets out of the shower and he nearly drops his towel in surprise. He holds it tight at the last second and thinks he doesn't imagine the brief look of disappointment that flashes across her face.

"I used the front door," she says in greeting, as he picks his way across his messy floor to his dresser and pulls out a clean pair of boxers. He wiggles them on under the towel and then drops it – no matter how many times they've seen each other naked (and that number keeps growing), he still feels nervous around her without the armor of jeans and sweaters.

"Your mom told me you were in the shower," she adds. He quickly pulls on a clean undershirt and moves to sit next to her on the bed. "She's making dinner."

"I'm not hungry," he says. His stomach promptly betrays him by growling. Nancy chuckles. "What's up?"

She gives him a look like he knows exactly what's up and he looks away from her.

"Are you okay?" she asks softly, hand resting on his shoulder. When he still won't look at her, she puts a finger on his jaw and gently turns his head to look at her. "Look, you don't have to tell me everything but you're clearly _not_ okay, and I'm just worried—"

He cuts her off by kissing her, hard and fast, then deep and slow. Pushes her onto her back on his bed and moves between her legs. She hasn't showered or changed since the woods and she smells sharp, like sweat and wood and girl. He buries his face in her neck, sucking lightly on skin as he breathes her in.

"Jonathan," she says, low and long, and it sends electricity down his spine, through his veins. She carefully pushes him back until she can look at him again. "You're not okay."

"I'm fine."

"You're _not_."

"I said _I'm fine_." He moves to kiss her again but she holds him back and here it is, here's the moment he wanted earlier. Here's the fight he's been itching for. He grabs her wrists, holds them tight enough that it might hurt, and presses them into the mattress. She flinches a little – from pain or fear he's not sure, and he's not sure which he'd prefer, either – but holds his gaze, steady, clear.

"Don't lie to me," she says. He sneers at her.

"What do you want me to say, Nance? That I'm sad and I'm scared and I need you?" He keeps his voice quiet but there's that anger, bubbling, rising, and unlike earlier with his mother it makes him go quieter, with a nasty edge he'd hate if it didn't feel so good. "Well I'm not, and I don't. I'm not fucking scared, I'm _angry_. I'm _sick_ and _tired_ of this _bullshit_ happening to my family."

He's gripping her wrists so tight his knuckles have gone white and she's going to have bruises, but he doesn't care, he doesn't care about anything right now except how good it feels to finally let this all out.

"I'm tired of the whispers at school, I'm tired of the graffiti on my locker, I'm tired of the way teachers look at me and the way my boss watches me and how Hopper comes to check on us and how _Steve_ keeps an eye on me and your big _fucking_ eyes and the way you watch me when you think I'm not looking. I'm tired of not sleeping, and I'm tired of Will's nightmares, and my nightmares, and my mom's appointments, and that _fucking_ lab and the _fucking_ shadows in this _fucking town!_ "

He has no idea how she does it, no idea how it happens, but she twists her hips and suddenly he's on his back and she's straddling his waist and he's still got her wrists in his hands but she's got all the power. Here he is again, Jonathan Byers: powerless, helpless, useless.

And just like that the dam opens and he's sobbing.

He hates crying but he can't stop it, can't do anything but release Nancy's hands and cover his face, try to hide, try to protect this last bit of himself. He can barely catch his breath, can't do anything but keen, but she maneuvers them onto their sides and wraps her arms around him and gently rocks him back and forth as his shoulders shake and his stomach heaves.

It feels like an eternity before he can hear anything other than his own pounding heart and wheezing, but it can't be more than a couple of minutes. He's never been one to cry for long.

When he comes back to himself he can hear her soft cooing nonsense; simple soothing sounds as she combs her fingers through his wet hair.

"I'm sorry," she says, when he's been reduced to sniffles. He laughs without any humor.

"Everyone needs to stop apologizing to me."

"No," she shakes her head. "I should've noticed. I should've said something. You can't—you're so busy taking care of everyone, all the time. Who's left to take care of you?"

He almost says he can take care of himself, but reconsiders. After the day he's had, that's a lie and both of them know it.

His head is pounding. He goes to wipe his running nose on his sleeve, remembers he doesn't have a sleeve, tries to snuffle up the snot. She laughs and pulls away a little bit, reaching down next to his bed until she finds a box of tissues from god knows where and holds it up for him. He takes one, blows hard, rolls onto his back. She props herself up on an elbow, looking down at him.

"I'm sorry," she says again. He reaches for the hand resting on her hip, holds it up. Her wrist is noticeably red.

"I'm sorry, too." He's holding her wrist, but he means so much more than that. He hopes she understands. He suspects she does.

She leans down and touches her lips to his, feather light. A warmth spreads through him and it feels like his chest is collapsing.

She opens her mouth to say something but they're interrupted by his mother, calling them to dinner.

He drops her hand and sighs. She looks up at the door, then back to him.

"I'm gonna grab us some sandwiches, ok?"

She doesn't wait for an answer, just gets up and goes. He drags his hands over his face. The silence is overbearing and he's laying diagonal on his bed, twisted and uncomfortable, so he pulls himself up to a seat and roots around in one of his shoeboxes of tapes until he finds "Imperial Bedroom." That seems gentle enough; he's had enough screaming for one day.

He's managed to get back a little bit of his composure and rearrange himself so he's laying the right way in bed, back to the wall and padded with a pillow, enough room for Nancy to slide in next to him.

And as if on cue she's back, a plate with two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on it and a glass of water. She kicks his door closed and sets the food on the nightstand, passes him the water, and settles into his side.

She doesn't say anything, just waits until he drains the glass to trade it for half a sandwich. She waits until he takes a bite to speak.

"You don't have to talk about it," she says and he frowns. Wishes his mouth wasn't full of peanut butter. Wishes his girlfriend wasn't so damn smart.

No, he doesn't mean that last part. He doesn't mean that at all.

"I think I just did." His words are muffled by the sandwich, but he gets them out. She snickers, and he feels a little relief.

"I don't think that's what most people mean when they say you should talk about your feelings. But it's a start."

He frowns, but takes another bite. He's starving.

"You don't have to talk about it now," she presses ahead, "but you do have to talk about it next time. You can't just… bottle it all up like this. You can't just do this alone. You're not alone. None of us are alone."

He deflates. His hand drops to his lap. Nancy plucks the sandwich out of his limp fingers and takes a bite. Raises her eyebrow in his direction.

"I'll try," he says. That's the best he can offer and not lie. She studies him and swallows before she answers.

"I'll take it."

There's something about the way Nancy talks that buoys him. A quiet fierceness, as if every word she says is a promise and her promises are never broken. He takes what's left of the sandwich, tosses it onto the plate behind her, and kisses her. This time it's not a distraction, or a punishment. It's a thank you.

They're interrupted by a soft knock on the door. Her grin is wry when they separate.

"Yeah," he calls. His door opens and Will's head pokes through.

"Hey," he says. "You guys wanna watch a movie? We got 'Jaws.'"

Yesterday he'd be angry for the interruption. Irritated by the intrusion into his private time, mad about the family obligation. But right now it sounds kinda nice. Will and his mom and Nancy curled up at his side, sharing popcorn, cheering on the shark (ever since he was little, the Byers have always cheered on the shark). Together.

He looks at Nancy. She nods.

"Yeah," he says, smiling and watching Will's face light up in turn. "Yeah, that sounds great."

+++

They're at the threshold of the door when Nancy reminds him to put on pants and bring the sandwiches. For the first time in weeks, his laugh feels real. 


End file.
